so I got summoned...

If you have time to do it, jury duty is one of more interesting, educational experiences you can have. I enjoyed it.
 
I've been called a few times, actually had to go in a time or two, but never got chosen for a jury. I wouldn't mind serving on a real jury at some point, on a real case.
 
warthog1984 said:
The amount of misstatements and outright falsehoods in that article makes my head hurt.

Jury "Nullification" works by blatantly abusing the 6th Amendment while shackling the legal system with the 5th. It is not a right or a privilege for a jury to overturn matters that belong to the legislature. Of course, that hasn't stopped POTUS, so I don't expect it'll stop a jury.
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Can you expand on what you found false from the article? I've always considered that the declaration(which isn't regulatory) trumped pretty much all state and federal laws. If I say the law should be violated with impunity, then that trumps what the legislature decided.

I thought the example in the article was a good one. Personal use laws on controlled substances seem like they are a violation of the constitution to me. So, I look at the legal statement from the state, and the defense position from the defendant, and then I look at the constitution and what it says, and finally I look at the declaration where the country was founded on the just powers of government derive from the consent of the governed. Well, I for one didn't consent to all these drug laws, and while I'm not one to break them, I'm also not going to imprison someone for inhaling a weed.

Am I as a citizen bound by legislation that I consider ill conceived and a violation of the constitution? It's an interesting legal concept.
 
warthog1984 said:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kangaroo_court
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A Kangaroo court is an attempt to deceive. Deception is key to the definition, because if there was no attempt to deceive the penalty on the accused would be applied without delay or deliberation. No sham court would take place.

So your categorization does not apply to the concept of jury nullification because there is no attempt to deceive. Jury nullification simply adds judgement of the law itself to the mix of the factors being deliberated in a case.

Even the government has difficulty being consistent in its application of the law because it rejudges the law constantly and tweeks it and redefines it to suit the case du jour it wishes to prosecute.
 
During my career in law enforcement, I have been the bailiff on 65-70 jury trials, everything from petty shoplifting to DUI to murder and a few civil matters. I have found that the vast majority of jurors are intelligent, attentive and take their role seriously.
 
The last time I showed up for jury duty I was dismissed for wearing my TEA Party pin. It was like... Magic!
 
Jury duty shows the true nature of America and humanity, too many just cant be ****ed to do what we need to do to maintain society outside our immediate interest, and our immediate interest is only getting paid. Want to know why America has problems, this thread says it all.
 
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N801BH said:
And getting paid 15 dollars a day... One could go broke REAL fast..:yikes:
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Federal grand jury only sits one day a week, if that, for the normal course of business. For some people, that can be a big financial hassle. They are more selective with grand jury selection than trial jury selection. Anybody with half a brain can get excused without trying too hard.
 
JB1842 said:
Federal grand jury only sits one day a week, if that, for the normal course of business. For some people, that can be a big financial hassle. They are more selective with grand jury selection than trial jury selection. Anybody with half a brain can get excused without trying too hard.
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This is the attitude I'm talking about. We hear everybody always squawking about their Rights, never about their Responsibility. With rights and freedom come responsibility to society. Having rights and freedom puts the burden of maintaining society on you. If you don't want that responsibility, shoulder that burden, and do the grunt work that needs to be done to get it done and maintain a peaceful society, then you will lose either the peaceful society or your rights and freedoms; most likely both, like here in America.

Hearing this come out of a US Marshal though, that is disapponting on a variety of levels, very sad.

As a collective society and species, we have to really start thinking on the collective whole and act in ways that benefit society on the whole first, and personal gain second. This will actually have a compounding effect that will leave us us individually more prosperous than we are considering personal gain first. When you bring up all of society, you ride up with it, so if you think about society first, you will come to the method of achieving your whatever business/personal transaction that will have the best overall result. There is always more than one way to do anything, the trick is to choose the most beneficial one, even if some of those benefits are not yours, but go to someone else. That is the economic mindset we need to adopt. We even gave Dr Nash a Nobel Prize for proving it mathematically, it is the Natural Law of Economics, when everybody cooperates rather than competes, everyone is better off, even those who would have been the winner under the competitive model.
 
Henning said:
This is the attitude I'm talking about. We hear everybody always squawking about their Rights, never about their Responsibility. With rights and freedom come responsibility to society. Having rights and freedom puts the burden of maintaining society on you. If you don't want that responsibility, shoulder that burden, and do the grunt work that needs to be done to get it done and maintain a peaceful society, then you will lose either the peaceful society or your rights and freedoms; most likely both, like here in America.

Hearing this come out of a US Marshal though, that is disapponting on a variety of levels, very sad.

As a collective society and species, we have to really start thinking on the collective whole and act in ways that benefit society on the whole first, and personal gain second. This will actually have a compounding effect that will leave us us individually more prosperous than we are considering personal gain first. When you bring up all of society, you ride up with it, so if you think about society first, you will come to the method of achieving your whatever business/personal transaction that will have the best overall result. There is always more than one way to do anything, the trick is to choose the most beneficial one, even if some of those benefits are not yours, but go to someone else. That is the economic mindset we need to adopt. We even gave Dr Nash a Nobel Prize for proving it mathematically, it is the Natural Law of Economics, when everybody cooperates rather than competes, everyone is better off, even those who would have been the winner under the competitive model.
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I'm not advocating getting out of jury duty, just telling you what my experience is in sitting through many a jury selection. I've been summoned for jury duty myself, but wasn't chosen.
 
I've served on juries, and have asked to be excused from juries.

Most recently was last month. I'm in the middle of remodeling season, which means I swing a hammer all day, and work my regular night shift at the hotel. If I do jury duty, remodeling stops.

Since I'm already five years into a three year renovation project, that can't happen. Worse, Mary would end up picking up even more hours. That can't happen, either.

So, without shame, I was asked to be excused. Life happens.
 
Clark1961 said:
I'm a 50something white male...no defense attorney is going to put up with me on the panel....just isn't going to happen...and so far I've always had to show
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Really?

I was a 50-something white male when I was selected to be on a jury. (I forget - are you in Arapahoe where I was?)

Very rewarding experience.
 
Only ever summoned once when I was up in Canada...and it was 2 days after my already scheduled wedding, so I called and said I had a trip already planned and they said "OK, no problem."

Not eligible down here.
 
Florida Cracker said:
The last time I showed up for jury duty I was dismissed for wearing my TEA Party pin. It was like... Magic!
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One of the most vocal advocates of the strict Constitution on this site and you deny the most fundamental requirement of citizenship.

Fascinating.
 
midlifeflyer said:
Really?

I was a 50-something white male when I was selected to be on a jury. (I forget - are you in Arapahoe where I was?)

Very rewarding experience.
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Jefferson but this is a city summons - I've set in the jury pool at the Taj...wasn't fun or rewarding though I did take the full day off work
 
I've only been called for city court. Local rules changed a few years ago. The first time, it was a 2-week period sitting in the holding area until lunch, waiting. More recently, it's a 1 day requirement, again sitting until lunch or until we're all excused.

On my 2 week stint I kept being rejected during voir dire. The defendant was a 20s-something from Texas, just moved to Colorado. Defendant's lawyer asked if I had any negative impressions of Texans. My reply was that we let Dan Reeves, from Texas, coach the Broncos. Out the door.

Next case - family problems. Someone asked if anyone had psychology training. A few did, out the door. I had to admit also. Judge asked what, my response was graduate work in human-computer interaction but I didn't work with people. 10 minute discussion with judge about the computer problems he was having...until both lawyers complained. Out the door.

The jury clerk, the prosecutor & the defendant's lawyer conspired to get me on a jury on the last day of that 2 week session. Didn't help.
 
Hmmm....I'd say my former boss had more than "half a brain" and ended up spending weeks on the grand jury.
 
murphey said:
One of the most vocal advocates of the strict Constitution on this site and you deny the most fundamental requirement of citizenship.

Fascinating.
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Not At All.

I was happy to serve, but damned if I was going to be made to pretend something that wasn't true. The defense and prosecutors didn't want me because they were offended by my pin, that's all on them, and their innate prejudiced.

I was told that another sure reject is if you bring a Bible to read to entertain yourself while you wait.
 
Everskyward said:
I've gotten summoned but only had to show up once, for a murder trial where they called half the county for selection. The selection process took three days but I was not selected. Had too high a lottery number. Besides, I probably looked like too much of a wild card for both sides. This is a small rural county and I don't quite fit the profile of a "peer".
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Probably because you went hiking in a skirt! :D
 
Clark1961 said:
I'm a 50something white male...no defense attorney is going to put up with me on the panel....just isn't going to happen...and so far I've always had to show
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I had to show and be called back three times for various interviews on a capital punishment case.

One of the questions posed in round one on a five page questionnaire was, "Do you feel that you can make the decision to put someone to death as may be required under Colorado statutes?

Apparently my answer on that question and about 35 others got me to round 3. Whatever that means.

Judge let me out at the personal one on one interview stage because I had pre-paid tickets to Hawaii. He didn't have to.

N801BH said:
And.... You are a pilot, and pilots need to be smart , intelligent and methodical.....

You will get thrown off before you even park your car in the courthouse parking lot...:yes::yes::yes:.......;)
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You forgot he's also an engineer. :)

Henning said:
Jury duty shows the true nature of America and humanity, too many just cant be ****ed to do what we need to do to maintain society outside our immediate interest, and our immediate interest is only getting paid. Want to know why America has problems, this thread says it all.
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So you say.

I was willing to cancel the vacation and take the $17K hit in income if the judge said I had to.

Assuming people aren't willing, is just a reflection on you, or your people you surround yourself with, and doesn't really match up with reality. It's also relatively convenient for your world view, which is, as demonstrated by this real world response, wrong... But world views that assume everyone is bad other than oneself always end up disproven, so that isn't a surprise to me.

I was served again last year. Called the number, they didn't need jurors. In my county there's a minimum of a year before one can be called again and the county is small so I wrote the "expiration date" on the postcard and stuck it on my cork board in my office.

But that's just playing by their rules. It shows no intent to shirk service on my part.

Being a Citizen isn't about a paycheck.
 
Clark1961 said:
Jefferson but this is a city summons - I've set in the jury pool at the Taj...wasn't fun or rewarding though I did take the full day off work
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Ah the Taj! It was a while back but I think I tried the first jury trial there when it opened. If I ever told the "how many lawyers does it take to run a tape recorder" story it was from that case.
 
midlifeflyer said:
Ah the Taj! It was a while back but I think I tried the first jury trial there when it opened. If I ever told the "how many lawyers does it take to run a tape recorder" story it was from that case.
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so......................

How many ?:confused:
 
I've only pulled jury duty a couple of times, but the last time was for a child abuse case. We heard three days of testimony from friends and neighbors of the accused and a couple of experts who examined the hand prints on the side of a 3 year old little girls face. The jury consisted of 8 women, a guy from Cambodia and another southern yahoo like myself. It was easy to tell that the mom had seen her share of whippings herself - though she stood by her man to the end. It was easy to tell from the guy's testimony alone that he was guilty as hell.

On the third day, we convened around a big round table and were given little note pads and pencils. The head juror said that it was time to review the past couple of days and debate the facts. I couldn't believe it. I stood up and, with an obviously agitated tone, told everyone that they simply had to answer three questions.
1. Was that a hand print on that baby's face? (two forensics experts said yes)
2. Is there any chance it got there by accident? (nobody's that stupid)
3. Was there anyone else around except the dad and baby? (he testified that he was the only one home at the time "came out of the shower and it was just there").

I had a unanimous guilty verdict in three minutes.

My point is that were I not there - I swear the guy would have gotten off. The majority were so afraid that they might be trashing an innocent person. The next day, a couple of the jurors asked the assistant DA (who prosecuted the case) if the guy had any history. Come to find out, he has three families in GA, FL and SC - and prior convictions for child abuse. Hey guys, you might be the only hope we have of getting scumbags off the street. Do anything you can to get on a jury and do what most people are too damn gutless to do!
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
The selection process is an Inefficient waste of time and money
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I was called recently. The case was for an armed robbery of a cellphone. We were told that there was no physical evidence - no phone, no gun. It was a he said, she said kind of thing (but both young men, no women). During the jury selection process it was clear I am a white male, I have two relatives in law enforcement. Thank you Mr. Miller, you may go home.

-Skip
 
I retired from a company that would make up the difference between the jury allowance and our regular pay. For some reason a lot of us wound up on jury duty.
 
pmanton said:
I retired from a company that would make up the difference between the jury allowance and our regular pay. For some reason a lot of us wound up on jury duty.
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I have always worked for companies with the same policy. It makes it much easier to do your duty when you know your family's need for a roof and food will not be interrupted.
 
Skip Miller said:
I was called recently. The case was for an armed robbery of a cellphone. We were told that there was no physical evidence - no phone, no gun. It was a he said, she said kind of thing (but both young men, no women). During the jury selection process it was clear I am a white male, I have two relatives in law enforcement. Thank you Mr. Miller, you may go home.

-Skip
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They decided to skip Miller?

Sent from my KFTHWA using Tapatalk
 
Florida Cracker said:
Not At All.

I was happy to serve, but damned if I was going to be made to pretend something that wasn't true. The defense and prosecutors didn't want me because they were offended by my pin, that's all on them, and their innate prejudiced.

I was told that another sure reject is if you bring a Bible to read to entertain yourself while you wait.
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In Colorado, by law, all courthouses are supposed to provide safe storage of firearms if you arrive with one. I bet that one would be entertaining to explain if they couldn't find the legally required storage locker and you were late for Court because of it. LOL.

(Very few do, but a few are properly equipped as required by State law, according to those checking on and tracking such things. And apparently you just walk right up to the security guard at the metal detector and tell them you need to disarm and how would they like to secure the firearm. In theory, one could walk in the front door with a long gun and then ask, but I suspect that'd bring some rather interesting attention, since in most rural counties, the courthouse and the sheriff are co-domiciled.)

It'd make for something fun to do if one was retired, and had plenty of time on their hands. Show up for jury duty with a shotgun...
 
denverpilot said:
In Colorado, by law, all courthouses are supposed to provide safe storage of firearms if you arrive with one. I bet that one would be entertaining to explain if they couldn't find the legally required storage locker and you were late for Court because of it. LOL.

(Very few do, but a few are properly equipped as required by State law, according to those checking on and tracking such things. And apparently you just walk right up to the security guard at the metal detector and tell them you need to disarm and how would they like to secure the firearm. In theory, one could walk in the front door with a long gun and then ask, but I suspect that'd bring some rather interesting attention, since in most rural counties, the courthouse and the sheriff are co-domiciled.)

It'd make for something fun to do if one was retired, and had plenty of time on their hands. Show up for jury duty with a shotgun...
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With a Go Pro camera strapped to your hat to document the results...:yes:..:D
 
N801BH said:
Make that multi millionaire...
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If you survive it. :) Family will appreciate it though.

I wouldn't try it in a few jurisdictions around here, and they're mostly the larger ones where your chances of even finding an officer who knows State law is near zero on any topic other than traffic citations...

I've asked a few long time officers if they're aware of the law. They usually say, "For me, not you, right?" LOL.

Yeah. We're all equal Citizens in their eyes. LOL. These are even the good ones.

Oh well. Got other things to do. But it's entertaining pretending the law actually matters to anyone in government anymore. ;)
 
Clark1961 said:
I'm a 50something white male...no defense attorney is going to put up with me on the panel....just isn't going to happen...and so far I've always had to show
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But, but, but... it is suppose to be a jury of your piers! :rolleyes:
 
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